Germans in Louisiana

This pathfinder is intended to guide interested researchers to the diverse materials available at the Williams Research Center (WRC) of the Historic New Orleans Collection concerning the history of Germans in New Orleans. From the first German settlers who came to the region in the 1720s to institutions that still exist today, the people, organizations, and activities presented here tell the story of a community that has been active for nearly as long as there has been a place called Louisiana. Through economic activity and cultural contributions, German peoples have helped create the very definition of Louisiana and New Orleans, even if those contributions have often been made from the margins.  

Following the overview below, the pathfinder is divided into seven subject-based sections. Within each section, holdings are grouped according to three categories: manuscripts, visual materials (photographs, illustrations 3-D objects), and library holdings (books, pamphlets, and other published works). Catalog links accompany each listing; check for finding aids at the bottom of the catalog record. 

Manuscript materials form the heart of HNOC’s German-related holdings, anchored by the following collections.  

• Deutsches Haus Collection (MSS 609Opens in new tab)  

• Archives of the Germania Lodge No. 46 Free Masons (EL2.2001Opens in new tab)  

• J. Hanno Deiler Papers (MSS 395Opens in new tab) 

• German Protestant Orphan Asylum Association Records (MSS 402Opens in new tab) 

• Faust Family Papers (MSS 479Opens in new tab) 

• Louis Alfred Wiltz Scrapbooks (84-115-LOpens in new tab) 

• Meysenbug-DeBuys Papers (87-5-LOpens in new tab) 

• Microfilm of the German Protestant Church Records Project (2000-43-L.1,Opens in new tab2000-43-L.2Opens in new tab, 2000-43-L.3Opens in new tab) 

• Werlein’s Music Store Scrapbooks (2005.0154Opens in new tab) 

• German Study File 

Additionally, there is a significant assemblage of sheet music (MSS 609.7Opens in new tab) and a large assortment of prints, photographs, postcards, letterheads, maps, objects, and books that are important to the history of German culture and society in New Orleans. It is an expansive theme, and these items are of types too numerous to list here. There is the silver work of the Dingeldein family and the Germanic motifs in photographs of Clarence John Laughlin. There are Barthélémy Lafon’s 1808 survey maps of the German Coast, and Alfred R. Waud’s sketches showing Germans in scenes along the Mississippi River. There is Grunewald’s sheet music and tableware from Kolb’s, a photo of a steamboat called Germania and photos of a WWI German submarine in the Mississippi, a romantic German description and illustration of the Union capture of New Orleans during the Civil War, and a German print showing the Battle of New Orleans. Call numbers are included for ease of identification in further inquiries, and detailed finding aids are included in the pathfinder for some of the larger manuscripts holdings.